How do you feel when having to work in teams? Do you suffer from anxiety when presented with public speaking? One of the first things I discovered when starting college is, I really dislike having to work in groups. I am so independent I don't like my results being based on how much work someone else puts in. Even at the age of 44 I still suffer from anxiety when speaking in public, I have just learned to manage that anxiety a little better. Well that is probably why I have put off taking SPC-1017 until the very end of my associates degree. Like all of us, I went on rate my professor the first semester and saw "you will have to do presentations, you will be working in groups". Immediately, I felt my anxiety level rising and thought nah I will take statistics, economics, business calculus anything to avoid the inevitable "speaking in public".
Over the last week or two, we watched our classmates prepare and make wonderful presentations. Some of you have had to overcome other obstacles aside from the fear of speaking in public. Living during this time of COVID we have had to deal with other issues like, not having access to the school bookstore, not receiving our book on time, and financial aid issues which may have interrupted when you started the class. But, even with all this, we have succeeded and made our first presentations!
I felt like all the information introduced in all the presentations was extremely valuable and well presented. Starting with group one explaining intercultural communication and why we all communicate differently. How cultures differ from each other and how that affects communication and the barriers that we must identify. Also, how race, ethnicity, sex, gender, and religion can affect communication. I thoroughly enjoyed some of the videos shared by all the groups. My favorite part of this chapter was presented by Marlon which explains chronemics, which is how the perception of time differs between cultures. Although I am American, my parents are Cuban, and I have seen from a young age that skewed perception of time (aka Cuban time).
Group two's topic on chapter 9, communicating in groups, was also very valuable. Maybe we sometimes take for granted that our family is a group, I know I have. Amel's presentation on virtual groups in this class and especially in this time of the pandemic was also very useful. What I hope everyone took from this presentation is how to work and communicate better as a group for the next set of presentations.
Lastly, let us not forget group three, and their presentation of chapter 10. Let me start by saying your slides were amazing! As we have been learning, non-verbal communication is just as important as what we say, and your slides said a lot. Whomever was the leader of this group took what they learned in chapter 10 and applied it to the presentation. Just like group 2, I feel that you applied what you studied in this chapter and that was obvious by the synergy among the group. Now that Professor Sinkoff is applying the pressure for the next themed presentation, let's show her what we are made of. Keep up the great work everyone!
Really good blog. Loved the visuals. Thanks for being such a great leader!
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